Telecommunication network operators face a wide range of challenges to ensure continued relevance and profitability. Core revenues are threatened by over-the-top content (OTT) providers, with exploding data usage and heavily video-based network usage. Subscribers are constantly demanding more from services in terms of variety, capacity and commercial offerings. Telecommunication technology also continues to accelerate in complexity, leading to the need for new hardware investment. Subscriber base expansion in saturated markets is driven by innovation and superior customer experience.
Current state-of-the art telecommunication technologies such as the long-term evolution (LTE) wireless standard, converged heterogeneous networks, next-generation network (NGN) and network function virtualization (NFV) help reduce operational costs, but understanding customer experience in a competitive market can give a network operator a competitive advantage. Whatever the technology used by a network operator, customer satisfaction can depend on the ability to provide a desired level of service to a diverse and fragmenting customer base. From residential consumers to multinational corporations, customers want access to services wherever, whenever and at the best possible price.
Service uptime is directly linked to a network operator's revenue stream. If there is no service, there can be no chargeable events. However, quality of experience (QoE) can be equally relevant. QoE is linked to revenue, although in a less direct way. Degradation of QoE eventually leads to churn, and high QoE deterioration can discourage use of the service.